Woodford Community Fund making grants for covid-19 relief, seeks more donations; non-profits can still apply

By Madison Dyment

University of Kentucky School of Journalism and Media

In these unprecedented times, many things remain uncertain for people across the country, but one thing Midway and Woodford County can count on is that their fellow community members will be there to support them.

One example is the Woodford County Community Fund’s recent creation of the Covid-19 Relief Fund, open for funding applications from any non-profit organization in the county.

Lori Garkovich, who has chaired the Community Fund for roughly three years, said the fund is providing support for non-profits that serve the community while the covid-19 outbreak disrupts many lives. With remaining funds left over from previous community enhancement grants, the organization felt obligated to offer provisions to “support their community every way they could,” she said.

“I said to our group, ‘I can’t sit here knowing we have money left,’ because I knew this was going to be bad,” Garkovich said in an interview. “My amazing board agreed to go through with it and we received three immediate requests after releasing it.”

The grants were offered the week of March 12 after notice that public schools in the county were shutting down.

In mid-March, a small committee of the Community Fund approved $6,000 in grants for non-profits Mentors & Meals, Spark Community Cafe, and Esperanza.

Grant money is still available for other non-profits, and the Community Fund has continued to raise more money so it will have more to give. 

Lori Garkovich

“My incredible, incredible colleagues decided that we are going to keep spending until we run out of money, so we’re still going,” said Garkovich.

The fund said in a press release, “Grants will be distributed on a rolling basis as fundraising continues throughout the outbreak and recovery phases of the crisis, making it possible to move resources quickly and adapt to evolving needs. Nonprofit agencies seeking funding may download the grant application at www.bgcf.org/woodfordcounty.”

Each application request is evaluated by a prospective budget submitted by the applicant with no limit for the amount of grant money available. Grant amounts have ranged from $1,200 to $3,000.

“We need to balance the demand for support with the availability of funds,” Garkovich said, “so we don’t have a limit for the grants.”

The grant application has few questions, designed for ease and speed of submission, and non-profits have received notice of funding in as quickly as 48 hours.

“It was probably the easiest and fastest grant I have ever written,” said Lisa Johnson, executive director and founder of Mentors & Meals. “Within 48 hours I heard the grant was approved, and in around four days we received a check in the mail. It was fast and enabled me to proceed with our plan of action.”

Mentors & Meals, an after-school program for at-risk middle schoolers, put the grant money towards providing hot meals for the 75 to 100 student enrollees and their families.

“Since receiving the WCF grant, we have delivered 960 hot meals and counting,” said Johnson. “On April 9, we are going to roll out an ‘M&Ms Meal Box’ which, in addition to delivering hot meals to the families, will provide ingredients and a recipe card so they have another meal to make over the weekend.”

Mentors & Meals also helps students who struggle with the imposed non-traditional instruction by helping those with no internet connection, keeping in contact with their students frequently, and interfacing with teachers at the middle school to understand what the students are required to complete and learn.

“We just want our families to know that we care about them and are here to help them through Covid-19,” said Johnson. “We will get through this and we will get through it together!”

The Spark Community Cafe, an inclusive “pay-what-you-can/pay-it-forward” restaurant, received grant money in partnership with Mentors & Meals. The café used its funding to prepare dinners for the program on Thursday evenings from March 12 through April 2.

Additionally, they also supplied breakfasts for food-insecure students at Woodford County High School, gave meals to hospice patients, a church program providing care for the homeless, and supported Esperanza and other groups that reach out to the cafe.

“The first day of school breakfasts, Spark served 175 people and by the second day, we served over 400 people,” said Garkovich, who also serves on the Spark board.

Esperanza is a non-profit run by Robin Miller of the Versailles Presbyterian Church, which provides support for Hispanic families in Woodford County. Having received the largest grant of around $3,000, the group channeled funds toward helping families who have lost income due to job loss during the crisis. They supply necessities such as food, baby formula and diapers, and cover utility and rents costs for these vulnerable families.

“A lot of people in these families work in the service industry and have lost their jobs,” said Garkovich, a retired professor in the University of Kentucky College of Agriculture, Food and Environment. “They won’t be eligible for the government-given $1,500 because they don’t have green cards even though they have legitimate tax numbers and are legally working.”

Any Woodford County non-profit is encouraged to reach out to the Woodford County Community Fund to apply for the Covid-19 Relief Fund, Garkovich said: “None of us want to think after that we had money that we could have given to support people, but we chose not to do it. We just want everyone to know that this money’s available and that we’re going to spend our interest income until it’s gone.”